The Homing Pigeon of State Street

I’ve been away from State Street for two months and I’m eating my words. Some of these words, written shortly after my May move to an apartment share with friends in the Fulton River district (read: across the street from trust-me-it’s-stinkier than-you-realize Blommers Chocolate factory.) I’m merely a mile west on Kinzie Street from my former Marina City digs, but the difference couldn’t feel more marked, and not in a groovy I’m-in-a-better-place way, either.

I moved due to the economy, with my game plan centering on exiting consulting, getting a day job, and moving on to the cheaper, more neighborhoody pastures of Lincoln Square on the far-ish North Side–my apartment share with friends an interim stop along the way. The day job element of the plan still holds–I’m pretty tired of being in charge of my own health insurance and taxes. But the leaving downtown thing? Not so much.

There are two things at work here. Most of all, I miss being able to walk out my front door and be in the middle of the capital of the middle of America. Knowing you’re a short walk from any Loop attraction, from (as most people don’t know) half a dozen great grocery stores, or from a one-seat bus, ‘L’, or Metra ride to anywhere in Chicagoland is pretty powerful. I said it in 2007 and dammit, I’m saying it again: I can easily visit outer-neighborhood trees, restaurants, and friends, but I’d prefer to sleep in the skyline. Call it the New Yorker in me, but I’m a raging urbanist at heart and I’d come of as far less locationally fickle if I would stop questioning that fact.

I’m also learning that, although I think there are many things woefully wrong with Marina City and the way it’s run (just look through my Marina City archives), I can’t fault the building staff. At all. You’ve got to love a condo high-rise with a daily cleaning schedule, a live-in 24-hour engineer, a responsive door staff, and regular exterminator visits.

In two months at my temporary, supposedly luxury digs in the high-rise rental K Station development, I’ve witnessed dirt sit in hallways and garbage sit in trash rooms for a week at a time, the engineering staff scoff at fixing broken appliances, and the door guards walk away from their posts for ten minutes at a time in the middle of the night, leaving the security door to the elevator lobby locked open.

Things are no better at Overly Frank‘s new South Loop pad, where I visit from time to time. Whenever the 56 bus bothers to come down Milwaukee or I make the 10 minute walk to the Clinton ‘L’ stop to wait another 10 minutes for Green Line train into the Loop, I can make it from Kinzie and Desplaines to 1130 South Michigan in…the same time it used to take me to get from Marina City to Frank’s old place in Lincoln Park.

Once at his Yolk-topping high-rise abode, I always need to make sure the Elphabugs aren’t present before I kick off my shoes. I call them that because the giant flying roaches the building is well known for on apartment-rating web sites may someday band together, levitate, and overthrow the roach wizard. Last night while I was catsitting for Frank, I briefly shared a bathtub with one of them.

Life would have been easier if it had been small enough to go down the drain. It being, however, the normal dimensions for an 1130 South Michigan roach–approaching a Glade Plug-In propped up on hairy black bobby pins–it took a ten-minute drenching and a half a can of Raid to stun the crayfish-sized thing enough to grab it with food tongs and flush it down the toilet. (I started out with a quarter can of Raid, but when I came back with the tongs, it raised its five-inch antennae and started to twitch.)

I pulled the chain twice, then took a whore’s bath. Any part of me I couldn’t reach with a washcloth I powdered and moved on. Then I slept on the couch with no part of my bedsheets touching the floor. Say what you want about Marina City, but at least there when you throw a shoe at the vermin it doesn’t get picket up and thrown back at you.

Too funny. The only insects I’ve ever seen in my Marina City apartment are the occasional spider and, rarely, tiny flying insects that look like gnats. And that’s only when I prop open the storm door to get better air flow.

Though when I first moved in almost eight years ago, I had this infestation of tiny little black spiders on my ceiling — must have been hundreds of them. I wouldn’t even sleep here until pest control came by to make sure they were all gone. That’s the extent of my pest problems…none of the ant problems you Eastenders have…

A couple of years ago I was visiting some friends in Florence. Walked into the bathroom to find a giant spider — at least six inches — in the bathtub. Needless to say, I didn’t stick around.

That would just about peg the Elphabug from last night. At Marina City, the only roached I ever had were smaller German ones from my downstairs neighbor, the hoarder. When she moved out–and left her poo collection behind–the roaches fanned out in search of a similarly crazy person to feed them. Several floors up and down, and several apartments to either side. But the management office got the exterminators in and I put down gel and borax and that was that. If I put borax down at Frank’s place, the roaches would probably just cut it with a razor and snort it.

I can’t believe you hate K Station! Are you in Echelon or Alta? I’m in Echelon and I really like it. And the elevator doors DO automatically lock. Either way, I have to tell you that it is WAY better and cleaner and nicer than a 3-flat in a “residential” neighborhood. You’re right, you’ll be miserable!

Lala, I’m with you in Echelon. I don’t hate it, I’ve just lived in better. Here the guards can automatically lock the elevator lobby door in the open position while they’re on break. I’ve seen it more than once. And, yeah, no three-flat for me. Period 🙂

I sleep pest-free and soundly in my Pilsen/Heart of Chicago 2-flat 1886 built wooden frame building. Almost five years of being roommate and hassle free, 15-20 minutes from work & school. Only a fire or lack of mortgage payment will EVER remove me!! No front-door security, but the bouncer from the bar next door keeps the riff raff away from our doorstep sweeps up the cigarette butts. Loop, meh!

You’ll remember that I had issues with my highrise condo rental during the first month after I moved in. I continue to remind myself: unlike the two downtown highrises I lived in for over 18 years downtown, my East Lakeview place wasn’t advertised as “luxury,” and the rent is now only 15% of what I make instead of 40%. After my landlord realized I pay rent a month in advance and keep the place immaculate, she’s bent over backwards to make sure whatever ails me is eliminated. Why, oh, why, did I wait so long to move out of the downtown area…?

MICHAEL THADDEUS DOYLE

I'm an NYC-native, Puerto Rican, Venezuelan, Chilean, French, Jewish convert, Disney World fan with an unexpected last name, living in Chicago. I believe in social justice, big cities, and public transit. I did urban planning in New York. I do communications strategy in Chicago. I've written this blog since 2005. I’ve been with my partner since 2010. And in 2015, I reunited with my family after 20 years apart. Believe in the world you want to live in.